


Fateful Detours

by anistarrose



Category: Gravity Falls, Infinity Train (Cartoon)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Crossover, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Stangst, flashbacks to Filbrick being an abusive father, non-graphic descriptions of pain/injury, warning for car accidents, working out family drama on an eldritch therapy train
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-21
Updated: 2019-09-03
Packaged: 2020-09-23 00:30:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 10,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20331070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anistarrose/pseuds/anistarrose
Summary: Ford misses his bus to Backupsmore, and tries to catch a ride on a train instead.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I’ve been craving a Gravity Falls/Infinity Train crossover for weeks now, so several late-night bursts of inspiration later, here we are! (Expected to be a 3-chapter fic, probably slightly under 10k words. I’m notoriously bad at word count estimates, but I’m pretty confident about the chapter count.)
> 
> (Big Infinity Train spoilers, by the way! In case that wasn't obvious.)

Ford’s room looked emptier than he could ever remember it being, and he was eager to leave it as soon as he could.

Carefully, he folded one last dress shirt and laid it down in his suitcase, which took some effort to zip closed. Most of his books, and a few bare-bones pieces of furniture, had already been taken to his Backupsmore dorm room, but his mother had insisted that he wait until the day before freshman orientation to move out of the house in Glass Shard Beach. And Ford had obliged, reluctantly.

He took a quick look under the bunk bed to make sure he wasn’t missing anything, but found nothing but dust bunnies. The bunk bed was a big part of why he was in such a rush to leave — sleeping in it every night still _stung_, a reminder of all the upheavals and betrayals and dashed hopes from last spring that had redirected his whole life and ruined his future.

<strike>And there was plenty of time to dwell on all that each night, because Ford still wasn’t used to falling asleep without someone else in the room.</strike>

He tried to slip out the front door without anyone noticing, but Caryn caught him.

“Hold it right there, Stanford!” she called. “You’re not seriously about to leave for college without giving your dear old Ma a hug first, are you?”

“Mom, I’m going to miss the bus at this rate,” Ford grumbled, but he gave her a quick hug as she kissed his forehead.

Filbrick watched from the stairs, looking neither proud nor disappointed. 

“Did you pack your suit and tie?” he asked.

“Yes, Dad. They’re already in the dorm room.”

“Good. Now, go impress some smart people.”

“In _Backupsmore_, I’m not sure how many other smart people there’ll be to impress,” Ford muttered under his breath. Then, raising his voice, he added: “Well… goodbye, I guess. I’ll call you when I get there, Mom.”

The bus stop was about halfway across town, and if the last bus of the day was actually running on time for once, Ford suspected he’d be cutting it close, so he walked down the street at a brisk pace. 

_I’ve got everything I need, right? No more textbooks to bring along, no one else to say goodbye to…_

He paused as he passed the sidewalk offshoot that led to the beach. His suitcase kept rolling, its extendable handle jabbing into his back. 

Had he left anything on the Stan O’ War? He hadn’t been there since… well, since the argument… 

He rubbed his back, took a look at his watch and did some quick mental math, and started to head for the beach.

_Just a quick detour. The bus will probably be late anyways._

***

The boat wasn’t _quite_ as much of a wreck as he’d feared, but enough of a wreck that he still couldn’t help but feel guilty.

Splotches of seagull poop dotted the deck, and something reeked like some small animal had gotten stuck under the planks and died. Pools of off-color water from last week’s rainstorms welled up in corners, and worst of all, the flag had evidently been stolen. 

Ford shooed away a few gulls as he boarded the boat and examined the contents of the cabin: a cheap compass, a slightly water-damaged vexillology book, and an unopened bag of toffee peanuts.

“What am I _doing_?” He shook his head. “Why did I think I’d find _anything_ useful here?!”

As he stormed off the boat, he could’ve sworn that the creaking of the planks beneath his feet sounded… disappointed. And lonely.

“No!” he muttered to himself, surely confusing anyone who might’ve been watching. “I’m not going to get guilted into missing my bus by an inanimate object! It is _perfectly normal_ for me to feel nostalgic, against my better judgement, for a project I poured hours of work into, but it is also _perfectly logical_ to leave it behind now. This was an unrealistic dream, and now I’m finally moving on to a more realistic one!”

He checked his watch, and sped up his pace. Assuming the last bus to Backupsmore was running late again, he should’ve still been able to make it…

He rounded the corner just in time to see the bus pulling away — slightly behind schedule, but not nearly as much as usual. Not quite as much as Ford had needed.

“Wait!” he yelled, breaking into a sprint and waving frantically in an attempt to catch the driver’s attention, but the wheels of his suitcase hit a bump in the side walk and he lost his grip on the handle. By the time he’d picked it up again, the bus was long gone.

“Well, fuck my whole life, I guess!” Ford muttered. He had half a mind to just lie down on the sidewalk and stay there until someone decided he was being too much of a nuisance and dragged him away. Why had he thought checking on the boat would be a worthwhile use of his time? Why had he _ever_ thought the boat would be worth anything?

He pulled out his Backupsmore brochure and double-checked the orientation schedule — it didn’t start until ten the next morning. That was more than enough time to take a series of taxis, or hitchhike, or _something_ — because spending another night in his parents’ house just wasn’t an option. Not with Caryn doting on her one remaining son with an enthusiasm meant for two, not with Filbrick constantly grilling Ford on how he planned to first make a good impression and later make a fortune, and certainly not with that empty, empty room and that goddamn bunk bed.

So Ford took a moment to stretch his already-sore arms, and then set off in the general direction of the road to Backupsmore.

***

Hitchhiking wasn’t as easy as Ford had hoped it would be, and the storm brewing overhead didn’t seem to do much to make drivers feel more sympathetic towards his plight.

“At least it’s not actually raining yet,” Ford said to himself, and was immediately met with a droplet of water striking his glasses. “Damn it.”

As he dried them off with his shirt, he heard a ear-grating ringing sound coming from ahead, and looked up to see the arms of the railroad gate closing. “_Damn_ it!”

For a second, he seriously considered making a mad dash for it, trying to duck under the gate and get across the tracks before the train could block them — but that moment of hesitation was all the train needed to speed into view.

And then, as if to to add insult to injury, it ground to a halt, blocking the road and stretching as far as the eye could see in either direction.

“Oh, come on!” Ford groaned as a few more raindrops struck his glasses. “Has the whole universe collectively decided not to cut me a single break today?!”

He took a deep breath. “Okay, calm down. I can probably sneak between the cars and get across…”

He blinked a few times as he approached the tracks, vision blurred by his wet glasses. Strangely, it looked less like the freight trains Ford was used to and more like a passenger train, with windows illuminated by a neon green light that stood out in the stormy August afternoon. 

He took a step towards the stairs near the back of a car, and to his surprise, the destination sign lit up to read _Backupsmore University_.

Which was weird, because this railroad crossing in the middle of nowhere didn’t seem like a train station, but Ford wasn’t about to let his good fortune go to waste. Lifting up his suitcase, he cautiously placed a foot on the first step…

A vortex of shimmering green and gold lit up the staircase, and before Ford could even react, everything went white.

***

Something poked Ford in the face, and he groaned, rolling to the side. “Five more minutes…”

He was met with a hissing noise that absolutely did not belong in his bedroom, and he instinctively swatted at the source of the sound. He opened his eyes just in time to see a bright orange praying mantis the size of his hand go flying.

“Ugh! What kind of dorm room is —”

His voice cut off as his eyes adjusted, and he took in his surroundings. Trees as tall as skyscrapers with leaves colored like bursts of flames surrounded him, and the sky overhead was a deep emerald green.

“Oh,” Ford muttered. “So I’m concussed and hallucinating. Wonderful.”

He heard the hissing sound again, and looked down to see the mantis approaching his foot, almost perfectly camouflaged atop the blanket of orange and crimson leaves that covered the forest floor. The only feature that stood out were its large blue-gray eyes, which showed more emotion than Ford had ever seen in an insect, looking almost… apologetic?

It chirped, and darted off between the trees, doubling back a moment later when it realized Ford wasn’t following it. It waved a scythe-like arm in the air, as if beckoning him.

“Hallucinating, and anthropomorphizing the emotions of a non-sapient insect,” Ford muttered to himself. “Unless I got… transported to another dimension, but how could that _possibly _—”

He looked down at his hands, expecting to see a clear indicator that he was dreaming like an incorrect number of fingers, but all six — and no more — were present on each hand. But that wasn’t all.

On his right palm was a number, green and glowing and unchanging:

_ **166** _

“This — this is just some kind of cruel joke! Would I hallucinate this?” He waved his hand in the air, wiped it on his shirt, spat on it and rubbed it with his thumb — but nothing even caused the glow to fade, much less wash off. “What the hell?”

The mantis hissed again, then began to scuttle off, and Ford got the distinct impression that it was getting impatient, and wouldn’t wait around for him another time. So he followed it, weaving between trees and listening to leaves crunch beneath his feet as he stepped over twisted roots and gurgling streams.

It was a genuinely beautiful scene, he had to admit. Under different circumstances, he might’ve stopped to do a sketch — though he struggled to imagine a scenario in which he’d be so unfazed by alien worlds that he’d feel comfortable just sitting down and taking a moment to draw.

As he walked, he checked the contents of his backpack — it contained everything he’d packed in it earlier that afternoon, as far as he could remember — but realized his suitcase was nowhere in sight. Which wasn’t a _unfixable_, since there hadn’t been anything in it that he couldn’t replace, but sure wasn’t great news either. He didn’t have the money to buy books whenever he felt like it, especially with classes starting in the fall. (Assuming he even had a chance to get out of whatever this place was and back to Backupsmore, that was.)

The mantis came to a halt, and Ford, lost in thought, only barely avoided stepping on it. It faced the largest tree Ford had seen yet, easily fifteen feet in diameter — but strangest of all was the door carved into the trunk, one lone sign of human involvement in what otherwise appeared to be an untouched wilderness.

The mantis turned back to Ford, chirped twice, and then sprung into a nearby bush, disappearing from sight. Not having any better plans, Ford shrugged and twisted the golden handle of the door. It swung open with a metallic creaking noise, but little resistance, to reveal…

_Finally_, the memory of boarding the train at the railroad crossing returned to Ford as he found himself staring at the bridge between two colossal train cars. As he stepped through the door, a gust of dry air instantly hit him, and he realized the train was speeding through a barren wasteland, devoid of any signs of civilization as far as he could see.

And he was pretty sure of two things: first, that this didn’t resemble any environment in the northeastern United States, and second, that he hadn’t been unconscious long enough for the train to leave that region.

“This _is_ another dimension? Or maybe a series of pocket dimensions? Unless…” He ducked back inside the forest car, and on a hunch, attempted to walk past the door’s tree. Sure enough, his face smacked into a wall, and the hyper-realistic image of the continuing forest path flickered for a moment. 

“Not so much pocket dimensions as sophisticated simulations, then,” Ford concluded, readjusting his glasses and rubbing his sore nose. He was probably going to wind up with a bruise. “Assuming the other cars work under the same rules…”

He hurried across the bridge between cars, grimacing as he looked down. Trying to jump down to the wasteland would be a reckless decision even by his standards, given the massive height drop as well as the lack of shelter or resources as far as the eye could see. Besides, it was the _train_ that held so many unanswered mysteries and potentially infinite environments to explore…

Ready to experience the discovery of a lifetime, Ford opened the next door, and found himself facing a classroom of screaming beavers.

There were about two dozen of them, and they made an unbearable racket as they threw themselves across the room, hurling school supplies at each other and gnawing on the wooden legs of their own desks and chairs. None of the students stood any taller than Ford’s knees, but their sheer numbers made it impossible for the teacher to control them. He was the lone anthropomorphic animal out of the bunch, appearing to be a perfectly normal human man except for his beaver head and tail, and he kept trying to smack the unruly students on their heads with a yardstick — only for one of them to snatch it out of his hands, and gnaw it in half in a matter of seconds.

The teacher stared at Ford with wide, pleading beaver eyes. Ford stared back.

“Why the _fuck_,” he asked, “did you give them desks made of wood?!”

A single tear ran down the beaver teacher’s cheek.

“What else were you expecting to happen?!” Ford shouted.

The teacher crumpled to the floor, curling into the fetal position as he began to softly weep. Ford started to cautiously make his way through the classroom, carefully stepping over beavers while holding his sleeve over his face to avoid inhaling any sawdust.

He nearly lost his balance and toppled to the ground when one beaver sprang past him, grabbing ahold of the handle at the bottom of the pull-down map hanging in the front of the classroom. The map immediately rolled back up, yanking the beaver to the top of the now-exposed blackboard. Grinning as evilly as a beaver could grin, it popped in a pair of earplugs, and then raked its claws across the blackboard’s surface.

Ford clapped his hands over his ears, concerns about sawdust abandoned, and sprinted for the exit. The other beavers charged after him, frothing at the mouth and wailing in agony from the sound, but he slammed the door behind him, and breathed a sigh of relief that their tiny little beaver hands weren’t quite dextrous enough to maneuver the door handle.

“On to the next… car… then,” he panted as he crossed the next bridge. “Let’s see how much more of this… my eardrums can take…”

***

One pizzeria car, one dance battle car (which Ford was initially skeptical about, but ended up absolutely rocking), and one literal train murder mystery car later, Ford found himself exploring an underground cavern. 

“Please refrain from touching the stalactites and stalagmites,” the bat tour guide cheerily informed him, “as the oils from your greasy human skin can damage them. But you’ll see that we’re approaching a small lake, and you will need to use the natural rock formations as stepping stones at that point, unless you want to go for a swim — which I wouldn’t recommend, since the water is only about fifty-five degrees Fahrenheit.”

“Do you get a lot of visitors here?” Ford asked it. “And do any of them prefer actually _reasonable_ temperature systems, like Celsius?”

“Maybe one visitor a week, if I’m lucky,” the bat replied. “The train has plenty of passengers, but also a _lot_ of other attractions besides this humble cave, so they’re spread fairly thin.”

Ford gestured to the number on his hand. “Do all the passengers have numbers like these?”

“Sure do. Not always the same number, though.”

“Do you know what it means?”

“Not a clue. I can tell you all about the geology of this place, though! Lots of famous caves are made of limestone, but this one is actually made of dolomite!”

Crossing the lake wasn’t too difficult, though Ford’s shoes were splashed a few times as he stepped between columns of stone that stood about even with the water level and resembled particularly sturdy lily pads. Even with ice-cold feet, he found that he couldn’t help but smile.

Aside from the beaver car, this train really hadn’t been so bad. He’d _much_ rather spend years learning from supernaturally smart animals than from underpaid professors at Backupsmore — not to mention the breathtaking environments he kept finding himself in, like the crimson forest and this massive cave system. The only thing keeping him from wanting to stay forever was the lack of companionship, with all the train’s inhabitants staying behind in their own cars…

“The door is right up ahead,” the bat chirped in his ear. “Can’t miss it. I hope you enjoy the rest of your stay on the train!”

“Do you know how I get _off_ the train?” Ford asked.

“Well, when you reach your destination, of course! Just don’t ask me what yours is, because I don’t know either.”

“Okay. Thanks for the cave facts, this was fun.”

“Anytime!”

As Ford crossed over to the next car, he happened to glance at his right palm:

_ **163** _

“Wait, it was 166 before! When did it change?”

He rushed back to the cave car, and poked his head back inside. “Hey! Uh, Batty? I didn’t catch your name — but anyways, did you see when my number changed? It dropped three whole points!”

The bat fluttered back towards him. “Hmm. It was definitely 166 back on the other side of the lake. I’m not sure beyond that.”

“Well, I guess that’s better than nothing. Thanks again.”

Ford sighed, as he began walking towards the next car for the second time. “Why wasn’t I paying more attention? That could’ve been a vital clue, but now I only have a vague time interval to go off of…”

He kept rambling to himself as he opened the next door and entered, hardly even paying attention to the contents of the new car. “Was it a vocal trigger? A physical trigger? Either of those I could’ve tested and tried to replicate, if only I was actually recording what I was _doing_ when —”

“No _fucking_ way,” he heard a familiar voice mutter. 

Halfway across the car, leaning up against a jagged cliff face, was Stanley.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, comments are appreciated as always! The cave car Ford visits is highly inspired by Onondaga Cave in Missouri - look up that cave's "Lily Pad Room," and you'll get a good idea of how Ford crossed that lake.
> 
> I have a pretty detailed outline for the remaining chapters, so ideally there won't be any long gaps between updates. It's just a matter of how often I have the time available to transform outline into prose.
> 
> [(also on tumblr)](https://anistarrose.tumblr.com/post/187153753696/fateful-detours-ch-1-gravity-falls-x-infinity)


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Stan and Ford have a rocky reunion, and Ford invokes the wrath of a scheming new enemy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part two of three has arrived! And don’t get me wrong, I’m quite satisfied with the first chapter, but this one was _much_ more exciting to write :)

_(12 hours earlier, below a stormy afternoon sky in northwestern New Jersey…_)

Stan anxiously drummed his fingers on the steering wheel, checking his mirrors for cops. No one appeared to be tailing him. 

Maybe the angry mob had been so hellbent on getting revenge in person that they hadn’t bothered to call the police, or maybe the police hadn’t thought a petty con artist was worth their time, but one thing was for sure — this was the fourth town Stan had gotten run out of this month, which meant that one way or another, staying in New Jersey any longer would surely just get him into even more trouble.

There was only one issue: as much as Stan once liked to brag about how he was going to sail away from that godforsaken state one day, he _missed_ New Jersey.

Or, more accurately, he missed the childhood he’d spent there. He missed Ford.

“You cut that out,” he told himself, shoving the train of thought to the back of his mind. “You think Stanford would care that I feel homesick? He doesn’t _deserve_ to be missed.”

His train of thought refused to go quietly, instead jumping straight off its rails. _But you _do_ miss him. That’s why you’re taking the longest possible detour out of Jersey, instead of just heading straight to Pennsylvania._

“Shut UP, Stanley!” Stan shouted, smacking his forehead, and the moment his concentration on driving wavered, his car went careening off the highway. He slammed on the brakes, but there was no traction on the muddy downhill slope, and the Stanleymobile kept sliding until a mighty oak tree intercepted it with a sickening crunch.

For a solid minute, Stan just sat with his head buried in his hands, afraid to even look at the damage. It was the passenger door area that had collided with the tree, so Stan himself had escaped any serious injury, but he didn’t know if the Stanleymobile — his only friend in the world, it felt like — would still be drivable.

Finally, he stepped outside in the rain, trudging through the mud without a single spark of optimism as he made his way around the El Diablo. One look at the front left wheel, pointing an angle it definitely wasn’t supposed to, told him everything he needed to know about whether the car could be salvaged.

He felt like crying, and had he been left alone like that for just one moment longer — his one possession of value wrecked in front of him, his already ruined life reduced to even more pathetic shambles than before — he indeed might have broken down and sobbed. But he was interrupted by a flash of light from the woods, and then another, and then countless more, until the flashing stopped and a constant, brilliant green glow was beaming out from between the trees. Beckoning him.

“What the fuck?” he muttered, but his hands were already opening the backseat door and pulling out the duffel bag that contained all his belongings. His feet were already guiding him into the woods, towards the source of the light…

It was a train, come to a stop right there in the middle of nowhere, advertising its destination of _Pennsylvania_ in bright green letters.

And Stan, under normal circumstances, was not an especially trusting person. But today, for some reason — maybe out of sheer bewildered curiosity, maybe because of some sinister spell the train had cast over him, or maybe just because he had nothing left to lose — he found himself throwing caution to the wind, and stepping aboard.

***

Needless to say, when Ford barged into the rock-climbing car and shouted “What are _you_ doing here?!” all angry and accusatory, Stan told an abbreviated version of the earlier events.

“Got in a wreck, needed a new ride, jumped on the train. Didn’t expect it to kidnap me into a wasteland full of cockroaches that try to suck my soul out if I leave.” His words came out blunt and flat, devoid of a whole flood of conflicting emotions that he struggled to hold back.

“You got off the train?!” Ford didn’t look worried about the state of Stan’s soul. If anything, he seemed incredulous at the notion that Stan would _want_ to leave.

“Of course! Do I look like I want to be trapped in some — some sick _experiment_, or whatever this thing is? I wouldn’t recommend getting off, though — I kinda almost died.”

_Please,_ Stan thought, _please say something that proves you’d care if I did die —_

Instead, Ford just stared down at Stan’s crossed arms. “Do you have a number?” he asked, as if that was a perfectly reasonable response to one’s estranged twin talking about their near-death experiences.

“Oh, have you already cracked the code? Have you figured out what the numbers mean using your fancy college brain?” Stan’s attempt to stay detached was breaking down more and more with each retort. “Yeah, I’ve got one, it’s —”

He held out his hand, then blinked in confusion. So did Ford.

“Wait, 153?” Stan asked. “It was 147 just a couple minutes ago! It’s been 147 the _whole_ time I was here!”

“It’s _lower_ than mine?” Ford muttered, narrowing his eyes. “Well, that certainly calls for some adjustments to my hypothesis…”

“So you _don’t_ know what it means?”

“I’ve only been on this train for a matter of _hours_!” Ford shot back defensively. “I simply don’t have enough data points to conclude anything with any sort of confidence!”

As he waved his hands in the air, Stan caught a glimpse of his number — 163. So Ford was ten points ahead of him… or could it be ten points behind?

“But I _will_ solve this,” Ford continued as he headed for the door on the opposite side of the room. “I’m sure one of the next few cars will provide some clues about —”

“Yeah, good luck with that door,” Stan interrupted. “The only key’s up at the top of that cliff.”

Ford tried to turn the handle, without success, and turned around to squint towards the roof of the car. “Ah. So it is.” He eyed the pulley system. “You couldn’t get up there on your own?”

“Look, there’s not a lot of handholds, okay? I’d like to see _you_ do better.”

“Sure.” Ford picked up a harness lying on the ground, and gestured towards the pulley system. “That’s a manual pulley, right? With two of us here, that’ll make the climb simple.”

“Yeah, but why am _I_ the one who has to pull _you_?” 

“Because I’m lighter, and you have more upper-body strength?” Ford told him. “I thought that would be obvious.”

Truth be told, Stan didn’t exactly want to attempt the climb again… but as petty as it was, he didn’t want Ford to be the one who arrived and immediately saved the day. Ford was always the irreplaceable one, the star of the show, while it felt like Stan was just the opposite — the twin who failed at anything he attempted on his own, and only got anywhere by riding on someone else’s coattails.

He begrudgingly took ahold of the rope as Ford adjusted his climbing harness. “Okay, am I just holding on to make sure you don’t fall, or am I gonna have to lift you the whole way up?”

“I can support my own weight, for the most part,” Ford replied as he began to climb. 

“You’re gonna want to move a few feet to the left,” Stan suggested. “You’re not going to get anywhere near the key if you climb straight up from there.”

“Really?” Ford craned his neck, trying to get a better view.

“Yes, really. Trust me, I can actually see the key without looking like an owl trying to turn its head around but failing because it had a broken neck.”

Ford reluctantly did as he was told, and the first three-fourths of the climb passed quickly and without much difficulty. But when he was just a few feet short of the key, Ford slowed to a halt, awkwardly glancing down at Stan.

“You… you were right, there’s not a whole lot of handholds or footholds up here.”

“Do you want me to pull you the rest of the way?”

“I don’t know… give me a second to try again here…”

“You better make up your mind soon, or my arms will get too tired to even get you down safely.”

“Alright, sure. Lift me the rest of the — woah!”

Stan pulled on the rope with all his strength, and Ford rapidly ascended past the rest of the climb. He pulled the key out of its slot at the top of the cliff, and let go of the rock wall altogether as Stan lowered him to the ground.

“That’s all?”

“Well, I only saw one keyhole in the door.”

There was an awkward silence, as Ford undid his harness and walked towards the exit with Stan trailing a bit behind him. As little as a few months ago, a moment like this would’ve surely been accompanied by a victory chant, or a high-six, or _something_, but now all they had was… a quiet tolerance of each other, and it felt unrealistic to hope for anything more.

_We’re both heading in the same direction,_ Stan realized. _What now?_

Maybe this quiet tolerance wasn’t so bad, if it meant he wouldn’t be alone.

“Hey, Sixer?” Stan asked as Ford opened the door, and Ford whirled around to look at him — not quite angry, but certainly confused.

_This was a bad idea. Why did I have to bring it up? I probably could’ve kept following him, and he wouldn’t have said anything._

“I was just, uh, wondering… I told you my story, but how did _you_ get on the train?”

Ford’s brow furrowed, his look of owlish confusion morphing into a scowl. “I missed my bus.”

“Why?” Stan blurted out, and immediately regretted it when he saw Ford’s expression darken even more. 

“I took an ill-advised detour,” Ford explained, speaking in that verbose, detached way that he only really did when he was upset, “that I didn’t have time for. I had a moment of… nostalgia, and wanted to check up on our old project before I left town…”

Staring off into space with a distant look in his eyes, Ford didn’t seem to notice it, but the number on his hand dropped from 163 to 159.

“The Stan O’ War?” Stan asked. “You’re still working on it?”

Ford snapped back to reality, his wistful expression immediately vanishing. “Of _course_ not. I wish I’d never even checked up on it in the first place.”

“Right,” Stan muttered. “Why would I expect anything different from _you_.”

Ford hurled the key to the ground, near Stan’s feet. “Sailing around the world was never going to happen, and we both should’ve known it!” he shouted. “You know what? I wouldn’t even be stuck on this goddamn train, if only we’d never gotten that _ridiculous_ idea in our heads! Or, if only _you_ hadn’t sabotaged my chances at getting a scholarship to any school other than fucking Backupsmore!”

He whirled around, slamming the door in Stan’s face as he bolted for the next car. Stan tried to follow, but found that the door had locked again, and wasted a few moments fumbling around for the key on the floor. By the time he got to the next car, he could see Ford standing on a raised platform near the opposite door, having already navigated the maze beneath him.

He locked eyes with Stan, no doubt expecting a plea for help. Expecting Stan to beg not to be left behind. (Again.)

But Stan realized — he didn’t want to give Ford the satisfaction of being correct. (Again.)

_I can solve puzzles on my own. I can scale cliffs on my own. I’ll get off this train on my own, and then we’ll see who the dumb twin really is._

“I said it before, and I’ll say it again,” he growled. “I don’t need you. I don’t need _anyone_.”

<strike>Even though the words came out of his own mouth, they still stung like a slap across the face.</strike>

For one single second, Ford looked caught off guard, but then he turned on his heel and left the room. Before the door even slammed shut, Stan’s hand began to flicker green as his number jumped up once again.

_ **169** _

***

“I can’t believe I thought this place wasn’t half-bad,” Ford muttered to himself, cranking a lever that lowered a drawbridge into place and opened a path to the car’s exit. His hands were slightly greasy from slotting a dislodged gear back into place, and as he wiped them off, he noticed that his number was rising, passing 166 and going higher than he’d ever seen it.

He took note of the changes in a journal, and headed for the exit. In other circumstances, he might’ve wanted to stay a little longer and study the bridge mechanism, maybe even do a few sketches, but right now <strike>his heart wasn’t in it</strike> he just wanted to get off the damn train as soon as possible, which meant there was little to no time available for unrelated mysteries.

But as <strike>dejected</strike> eager to move on as he was, he couldn’t help but find himself captivated by the contents of the next car. Floor-to-ceiling shelves lined every wall, holding carefully organized books, strange knickknacks, and a surprising number of yarn balls… 

“Ahem,” began a voice from the shadows, interrupting his train of thought, “but did you not even think to knock? Have you no manners?”

The car’s resident slunk out from behind a table — a graceful cream-colored cat, dressed in a sharp navy blue suit and golden silk ascot. “Passengers these days, I swear…”

Ford ignored her, eyes glued to table’s contents. One compact device lit up as he approached it, displaying a waveform that oscillated in time with his footsteps, and he picked it up, snapping his fingers experimentally. One again, the display responded.

“You put that down!” the cat hissed. “My collection is more valuable than you could possibly imagine —”

“Oh, I’m sure it is. I’m so sorry,” Ford hurriedly apologized, lowering the device back down to the tabletop but still holding it between two of his fingers. Recalling childhood adventures in petty crime, he sought to create a distraction with his free hand, reaching for an astrolabe that sat on a nearby shelf. “What’s this? Is it decorative, or —”

“Don’t touch that either!” the cat yowled, springing up on to the shelf to snatch the astrolabe away. As she moved, Ford palmed the smaller device and slipped it into the pocket of his pants, and couldn’t help but smirk as the cat failed to notice.

“Okay, okay, I get the message. Is there anything in this room I _can_ touch?”

“I’m sure there will be _plenty _of things in the _next_ train car!” the cat hissed. “So go on, make yourself scarce!”

“But your whole collection is so interesting…” Ford replied, looking over the room and assessing which other items he might be able to sneak into his pockets for further study. “Won’t you at least tell me where you found all this?”

The cat blinked twice, and then the corners of the her mouth curled into a smile. “Oh, I can do better than that. I think I know just the thing that will interest you, Mister… what was your name? I don’t think you ever introduced yourself.”

“I’m Ford Pines, pleased to meet you. I didn’t catch your name either…?”

“I’m the Cat,” the Cat told him as she bounded from shelf to shelf. As she rifled through a stack of objects resembling sleek black cassette tapes, she still looked up to glance at Ford every few seconds, as if she still didn’t trust him not to touch her possessions.

“Now let’s see… ah, this _edition_ should suit our purposes well. Just take a seat by the television, and I’ll get this documentary started!”

“What’s it about?” Ford asked, settling into the chair. “Any specific artifact or device in particular, or just a general overview? Did you produce and narrate it yourself?”

“Oh, I don’t want to give away the surprise,” the Cat told him as she inserted the tape, “but I promise, once it gets started, you won’t be able to look away.”

She pressed the play button, and Ford’s mind was filled with static.

***

In any other scenario, the Cat would have at that point taken a few moments to simply stare approvingly at her completed trap, but not five seconds after the television had turned on, the door to her car swung open again.

It took Stan’s eyes another second or two to fully adjust to the dimmer lighting, but not nearly that long for him to realize something was _very_ wrong.

“What the fuck?” He bolted past the startled Cat, shaking Ford’s limp body by the shoulders. Some instinct told him not to look at the TV, so he locked eyes with Ford instead — with Ford’s wide open, yet glazed-over eyes that didn’t show a single spark of awareness.

“Ford, can you hear me?” No response.

“Ford, I know you’re mad, but this isn’t funny!” Complete silence, aside from static crackling in the background.

“What did you do to him?” Stan whirled towards the Cat, who grinned sheepishly while slowly backing away. “What did you do to my brother?!”

“Oh, I just… introduced him to a meditative exercise! He was very excited to try it, you see, and requested that I not let anyone interrupt him —”

“Bullshit,” Stan growled. “I know a scam artist when I see one! What did you _really_ do to him?!”

“He messed with my things and refused to leave me in peace!” the Cat hissed. “He had it coming!”

“Messed with your things, huh?” In one fluid motion, Stan snatched a ball of yarn of a shelf with one hand and pulled out a pocket lighter with the other, flicking the wheel a few times before a bright blue flame spluttered to life. “Tell me how to get him back, or I light this baby up and toss it at a bookshelf.”

The Cat gasped when he pulled out the lighter, but then unsheathed her claws and sneered defiantly. “If you’re both on this train, but traveling separately… well, his number’s already sky-high and only getting higher. He doesn’t want anything to do with you ever again, does he?”

Stan flinched, and the Cat smiled. “I assumed as much. You poor thing — all you want is to ‘get your brother back,’ but it’s already doomed to be a hopeless endeavour.”

Stan glanced back at Ford, slumped over in the chair and looking about as alive as a corpse.

“Maybe it _is_ hopeless,” he admitted. “Maybe he never will forgive me. But if I left him here like this, I’d… I’d _never_ forgive myself. I could lie to myself about it for as long as I wanted, I could remind myself how he wouldn’t do the same for me, but — but that wouldn’t make me feel any less terrible. He’s my brother, and I’m going to save him, because… because that’s just who I _am_.”

He unwound a strand of yarn, and dangled it over the lighter flame. Blue sparks traveled up the off-white string like a fuse, racing to engulf the entire yarn ball.

“And I’m also a person who _meant_ what I said about burning everything in here. So for the last time, I’m asking you: HOW DO I SAVE MY BROTHER?”

“Playing on that television is a record of everything that makes him _him_,” the Cat explained. “If you look at the screen, you’ll join him inside those memories, but I can’t promise he’ll want to come back out with you. In fact, I’d bet against it.”

“I don’t care what you’d bet on.” Stan blew out the flame, and hurled the extinguished yarn ball at the wall. The Cat narrowly dodged the rebound, hissing as she ducked out of the way.

“Don’t worry, Ford,” Stan whispered. “I’m coming.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> End notes:
> 
> Being with yellow eyes and fancy outfit: *exists*  
Ford: well, they couldn’t possibly have any ulterior motives!
> 
> Anyways, thank you for reading and as always, comments are appreciated! The third and final chapter should go up in early September, if everything goes according to plan.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Memories are relived, conversations are had, and two journeys come to an end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we are at the final chapter! This has been a very fun crossover to write, and this chapter is easily my favorite in the whole fic.
> 
> (Do note that the content warnings have gotten a little heavier for this chapter, but it’s no darker than the Gravity Falls canon.)
> 
> [(also on tumblr)](https://anistarrose.tumblr.com/post/187475186041/fateful-detours-ch-3-gravity-falls-x-infinity)

Stan wasn’t sure what to expect when he looked at the TV. The Cat had said it contained everything that made Ford _Ford_, so some part of his mind couldn’t help but imagine a swirling vortex of sketch-filled journals and science textbooks, of broken inventions and bitter parting words.

But instead, he found himself standing in a plain white hallway, staticked-out silhouettes flickering on every wall. Some were abstract, like random interference, but others felt more familiar, like compasses or bags of snack food. Or like a ship’s mast with two makeshift flags hung from it.

Stan checked his hand, and saw that his number was still there.

_ **81** _

“Ford?” he called out. “Are you in here?”

Not only was there no response, but the sound of the static grew a little louder, as if trying to drown out his voice.

“Couldn’t be that easy, huh,” he muttered as he set off down the hallway. “I’ll just have to find him myself, then.”

At the end of the room was a wall of pure static, crackling and roaring incomprehensibly. But for a moment, Stan could _swear_ he heard familiar voices conversing on the other side, and as they faded out, he put his ear up to the wall to listen more closely —

His hand ever so slightly brushed the surface, and it immediately collapsed under the pressure, its strange gravity dragging him through the ripples of static and into a bright, colorful scene. Stan’s head spun, and it took him a moment to get his bearings — but there Ford was, he realized, just down the stairs and in front of him with his back turned. Safe and sound, and rubbing his chin like he was conscious and alert.

Just as Stan was about to speak up, two hushed voices beat him to the punch. They came from a pair of familiar figures just a few feet in front of Ford… 

_It was Stan and Ford themselves, aged eleven, standing in front of their middle school lockers._

_“C’mon, Sixer! No one will notice, I guarantee it!”_

_“But if we _do_ get caught, they’ll give us failing grades for sure! It’s a big risk to take…”_

_Young Stan made pleading eyes. “Please? I’m going to fail math anyway if we don’t try something…”_

_“Alright,” young Ford agreed reluctantly, taking his glasses off and handing them over to Stanley. “I’ll take your math test.”_

Stan suppressed a chuckle as he watched the younger version of his brother squint awkwardly as he adjusted to the lack of glasses, but the real Ford just shook his head with a sigh.

“Selfish as always,” he muttered, and the scene changed.

_Stan and Ford, aged fifteen, stood outside the local movie theater. Both of them were sorting through their pockets for change, and neither was coming up with much of anything._

_“I’ve only got enough for one ticket.”_

_“Same here.”_

_“And you want to waste it on some raunchy comedy we’d have to lie about our ages to even get into?”_

_“If the only other option is some over-the-top sci-fi flick, then yeah! I do!”_

_“Stan, I have been waiting the better part of three years for this movie! I’ve been theorizing about the plot for _three years_, and if you think I’m not going to see it opening night —” _

_Stan threw an arm over Ford’s shoulder. “It’s gonna be _packed_ opening night, Ford. You really want to see the first screening, where all the other rabid fans are there and talking so loud that you can hardly hear the actors?”_

_Ford frowned. “I don’t know…”_

“And what did we end up doing?” the real Ford asked, shaking his head. “Seeing _his_ choice of movie! Because he only ever cared about _himself_, and I just _went along_ with it!”

As Ford waved his hands in the air, Stan caught a glimpse of his number shooting up:

_ **225** _

** _257_ **

** _288_ **

** _340_ **

**_…_**

“I went along with it,” Ford repeated, “until…”

Their surroundings wavered, sidewalk morphing into carpet as street lights flickered and turned into familiar lamps from the Pines family household.

“No.” Ford shook his head. “Not this, not again…”

_ **361** _

In a burst of static, the scene shifted once again, this time to a high school hallway.

“...Sixer? You okay?” Stan choked out.

Ford didn’t even look away from the memory.

_Skipping class, getting caught sneaking out of the school, being sent to detention._

“He always just dragged me down,” Ford growled. 

_ **381** _

** __ ** _Working on the boat instead of studying for an upcoming chemistry exam._

“I should’ve cut him off a long time ago.”

_ **415** _

** __ ** _Two science fair projects sitting side by side — one, a non-functional robot, the other, an invention that should’ve revolutionized the world._

“I always knew that I’d be better off without him.”

_ **472** _

** _491_ **

** _518_ **

“So that’s really what you think about me,” Stan whispered. Ford gave no sign of having heard him.

He reached for Ford’s hand, but without even turning around, Ford swatted him away.

_ **550** _

And Stan… 

Stan had been prepared for Ford not to forgive him. Stan had been prepared to drag Ford out kicking and screaming. 

He hadn’t been prepared to hear that Ford had _never_ wanted him around in the first place.

“You know what?” he shouted. “FINE!!” 

<strike>It wasn’t fine, no matter how loud he screamed that it was.</strike>

“You can be better off without me right here, in this fucked up horror movie television, for the restof all_ eternity_! See if I care!!”

Ford didn’t flinch.

“SEE IF I CARE!” Stan repeated, whirling around and storming off towards the edge of the memory.

He didn’t look at his hands, but if he had, he would’ve seen his number jumping up:

_ **106** _

** _160_ **

** _195_ **

He didn’t look back at Ford either, but if he had, he would’ve seen that Ford’s number was no longer visible, because his hands and arms had become obscured by a shifting pattern of static.

“I never needed him,” Ford mumbled, his voice crackling with interference. “I never needed anyone.”

  
  
  
  


Everything was white, and everything was blurry. It was white because Stan had at some point, without realizing it, made his way back to that first empty hallway he’d found himself in, and it was blurry because he had long since given up on trying not to sob.

He knew, instinctively, that from this room he could leave whenever he wanted simply by willing it to happen, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. He may have been a liar through and through, sometimes out of selfishness and sometimes out of necessity, but he’d told the Cat the truth. If he left Ford here, he’d never forgive himself.

He slumped to the ground, pulling his knees close to his chest. Years ago, his mother had told him that dwelling on an issue would always be more painful, in the long run, than any choice you could make to try and change the situation — and after he’d gotten kicked out, he’d tried his best to take that advice to heart, and focus on things he could _do_ to turn his life around.

But now, he wasn’t so sure her advice rang true. He only had two choices — trying to find Ford again and save him, or abandoning him for good, and he knew both of them would just hurt him more than he could ever possibly bear.

_Everything_ hurt. Every happy memory he’d once desperatelylonged to relive just _hurt_ now, corrupted by the knowledge that Ford had never really been happy in them. That Ford had never truly wanted him around. 

Even back during the happiest summer of their lives, when they’d discovered —

Stan covered his ears as a burst of static rang through the room like a clap of thunder. Still sitting on the ground, he turned to face the wall he’d previously had his back to… 

And there it was again — the silhouette of a ship’s mast that he’d glimpsed on the way in, two children’s t-shirts flying from it like flags. But this time, the whole ship below it was visible too, bobbing up and down as choppy waves of static battered its hull.

Stan outstretched a hand towards it, his number obscured beneath his palm, and a blast of salty ocean air struck him in the face as the world exploded into color.

He stood on the bow of the Stan O’ War — the completely repaired, seaworthy Stan O’ War, its deck polished and cabin furnished — and faced a tropical coastline, dotted with emerald palm trees and surrounded by vivid pink coral reefs. A colossal volcano rose above the horizon, with a plume of smoke and ash lazily drifting away from the crater at the top, and beneath the crystal-clear waves Stan could spot a pair of sea turtles following the ship, keeping their distance but eyeing it curiously.

Which was all very confusing, because Stan couldn’t remember visiting a place like this and was fairly certain Ford hadn’t either…

The moment that thought popped into his head, his surrounding began to change. Colors grew less vivid, his depth perception failed him, and shadows vanished altogether as the scene reverted to a cartoonish state, complete with dialogue bubbles and sound-effects written out in familiar handwriting.

Stan stood in the pages of a comic book he’d drawn eight long years ago, currently held by the memory of a ten-year-old Ford.

_“You really think we’ll get to go on adventures like this one day?” Ford asked, but he didn’t sound skeptical. If anything, he sounded _wistful_, like he _wanted_ to believe it._

_The young Stan from the memory watched with a satisfied smile as Ford flipped through the comic. “I don’t think it. I _know_ it.”_

The scene shifted, and Stan found himself kneeling on the beach, watching his younger self hammer nails into a plank on the boat while Ford held it in place. Both of them looked sweaty and exhausted, yet also… so, _so_ happy.

_“Wherever we go,” the young Ford declared like a mantra, “we go together.”_

From somewhere not quite within the memory, Stan heard the sound of a distorted gasp.

Kneeling on the opposite side of their younger selves and watching them intently was the real Ford — except now, only his face was visible, while the rest of his body was awash with static. The pattern flickered erratically, branched and jagged patterns of lightning bolts crackling within it, but Ford seemed oblivious to everything except the events playing out in the memory in front of him.

“We were _both_ so happy,” he whispered, eyes flickering between the two younger twins as they pressed their hands together in a high-six. “What changed?”

“Stanford, we — we’ve _gotta_ get you out of here,” Stan choked out. “I don’t know what’s happening to you, but it —”

Ford’s head snapped up to look at Stan, to _really_ look at him for the first time since they’d entered his memories, with a incredulity in his eyes that suggested he was only just now realizing that the real Stan was in there with him.

“This isn’t right,” Ford mumbled — and initially, Stan flinched, assuming the words were directed at him. But a moment later, the speed of the memory accelerated to a dizzying blur, fast-forwarding to more scenes familiar to both twins.

_Stan going to Ford’s gym class while Ford took his math test, and coming home with a black eye but also a smile on his face, because he’d given a couple of Ford’s bullies the kicks in the shins that they’d deserved._

_Stan and Ford staying in the theater after watching Stan’s choice of comedy flick, and sneaking into the second showing of the sci-fi movie Ford had been anticipating for so long. Dodging the worst of the crowds, and having a great time in both with the theaters practically all to themselves._

_Making the most of detention together, passing notes behind the teacher’s back._

With each memory, the static covering Ford receded further, first leaving his hair and then his shoulders and arms. He stared down at his hand, waiting for it too to become clear again and reveal the number on his palm —

Just as the receding line of static reached his wrist, the scene shifted one more time. They stood in a familiar living room, lit only by the pale blue light of a television… 

“The argument,” Ford whispered. 

Stan felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end, as the static shot back up to Ford’s shoulders.

_In the memory, Ford stormed into the room, waving a crumpled bag of toffee peanuts in the air as he stared daggers at Stan. “Can you explain what _this_ was doing next to my broken project?!”_

_And Stan sneered back at him, throwing his paddleball to the ground where it snapped in two. “College dreams are ruined, huh? Guess you’ve got _no choice_ but to go sailing now!”_

_The TV behind Ford exploded, glass shattering as bolts of blue electricity arced from wall to wall. The whole room trembled as sparks and smoke filled the air, and both the Ford from the memory and the Ford cloaked in static stumbled as they tried to step away from the searing rays of plasma —_

“Sixer!” Stan grabbed Ford’s hand, and a jolt of electricity ran up his arm, sending black and white pixels flickering across his vision. “Ford, are you the one doing this?!”

Ford hung limp in the air, suspended in place where Stan had caught him halfway through a fall. The spot where their hands met _burned_ like nothing Stan had ever felt before, like the static was trying to creep up his own veins and into his own body, to unmake him and rewrite him and embitter him from the inside out — but all Stan could bring himself to do was tighten his grip, as he watched a crack snake through the floor beneath Ford’s feet.

“You’ve got to stop this, Ford! This _isn’t_ what happened!”

The whole room shuddered as the crack split open, revealing a massive chasm of static with no bottom in sight. Ford staggered backwards, the ground beneath him crumbling as more and more glowing white cracks zigzagged through it — but before he could topple backwards and fall, Stan used his free hand to grab him by the collar of his staticked-out shirt.

It felt less like he was grabbing something material and more like he was sticking his hand in a fire, but he still pulled Ford closer, until he could wrap an arm around Ford’s back.

“And what really happened wasn’t great, either — it was _awful_ — but I never wanted it to happen, I swear! I’m so sorry, Ford — I never wanted to ruin your dreams, and I don’t want to lose you in here, either! These aren’t your real memories, and — and I know how lying to yourself feels like it’ll hurt less, but in the long run, it… it _doesn’t_. I promise!”

His arms went numb, and his vision began to fade as something wet sizzled and evaporated on his cheek. 

“And if you still want to be mad at me, I — I can’t blame you. But be mad at me for what I really did! Be mad at me when you’re safe at home, or at college, or wherever you end up in life — not in here! Please, Ford, let me help you get _out_ of this place…”

He heard a voice, close to his ear but garbled by static.

“Ford? You with me?”

Ford tried again, and though it was quieter this time, it came out comprehensible.

“Was it _me_ who changed?”

“Ford, we… we both fucked up. I should’ve just _told_ you about breaking the machine as soon as it happened — then you might’ve been able to fix it…”

The burning feeling began to subside, and the crumbling living room reassembled itself as the scene playing out inside started over.

_“I might’ve accidentally been… horsing around…”_

_“This was no accident, Stan! _You_ did this!”_

“I still should’ve believed you,” Ford mumbled, stepping back from Stan as he stared at the memory. The static dropped below his collar, then below his shoulders. 

_“Maybe there's a silver lining, huh? Treasure hunting?”_

_“Are you kidding me? Why would I want to do anything with the person who sabotaged my entire _future_?!”_

“And I shouldn’t have brought up the boat like that!” Stan told him. “I shouldn’t have _joked_ about it! I didn’t realize how — how _important_ that school on the other side of the country was to you, but now I do…”

Both twins flinched as they watched Filbrick enter the memory, grabbing Stan by his shirt.

“I should’ve stood up to Dad!” Ford went on, his head in his hands. “I never should’ve let him kick you out —”

“You know you wouldn’t have been able to change his mind.” Stan stared at the ground. “_I_ should’ve known that, instead of blaming you for not taking my side…”

“I never wanted to cut ties with you, Stan.” The static receded even further as Ford spoke, dropping down to the level of his belt. “Not when I wanted to go to West Coast Tech, and not even after the argument — but when Dad threw you out, I convinced myself that I never wanted to see you again. That you’d _always_ just been dragging me down — because it was easier to believe that.” 

He took a deep breath. “Being angry at someone you hate… it’s _so much_ easier than being angry at someone you love, even if you really _do_ love that person. Without that contradiction making you second-guess every feeling you have, it’s so much simpler, so much easier to bear…”

The scene flickered, changing to a memory that Stan had never seen before. It was from after he’d gotten kicked out, he realized.

_Ford sat on the stairs of Pines Pawns, slouching and glowering at the floor as he listened to Filbrick and Caryn arguing._

_“He’s seventeen! Teenagers ruin things, it’s what they _do_! You didn’t have to ruin his whole _life _to punish him!” Caryn shouted._

_“That freeloader has _been_ ruining the smart one for years!” Filbrick shot back. “Done nothing but drag his brother down their whole lives, and it’s about _time_ we cut him off!”_

_He whirled around, and noticed Ford watching them. “Right, Stanford? Weren’t you _tired_ of going along with every harebrained scheme that popped into his head? Of doing all his math homework? Of humoring him, when he said he wanted to sail around the world? Wasn’t it _suffocating_?!”_

_Ford didn’t say anything, but he gave a half-hearted nod before trudging back up to his room._

Outside of the memory, the real Ford spoke up. “No, Dad. It wasn’t.”

As the last few pixels of static covering his feet disappeared, he turned to Stan and outstretched his arms for a embrace. “I missed you, Stanley.”

Stan accepted the hug without a second thought. “I missed you too, Sixer,” he whispered.

Waves of static washed over the room for one last time, and when they subsided, Stan was once again kneeling on the floor of the Cat’s car. The Cat herself still stood on the other end of the room, hissing quietly when she noticed Stan awaken.

“Ford, are you okay?” Stan stood up and turned around, and to his relief, Ford was sitting up straight — and staring at his hand, as it shone a brighter green than it ever had before.

And so was Stan’s hand, as it whirled through number after number far too quickly to read. For the first time, it felt warm — not warm like the burn from the static, but warm like hot chocolate and lazy summers and companionship, warm in a way Stan hadn’t felt in months.

_ **0** _

Two beams of light shot up from Stan and Ford’s hands in unison, and on each side of the room, one half of a door appeared, outlined in green and slowly sliding together. When they met, a familiar golden vortex appeared and two columns of light sprouted from it, coiling around each other like a double helix as they stretched upwards and out of the train.

And visible inside the door, clear as day, was the Stan O’ War — right where they’d left it, filthy from months of neglect but still salvageable. Still not that far from seaworthy, in the grand scheme of things.

“Oh,” Ford mumbled. “Of course. That’s really _far_ more simple than anything I theorized about the numbers…”

He turned to Stan. “Are… are you ready to leave?”

Stan gave him a thumbs up. “Wherever we go, we go together.”

As he followed Ford towards the exit, he turned around one last time. “Hey, Cat? We won’t miss you.”

Ford didn’t bother to turn around, but he did wave a double middle finger in the Cat’s direction, which Stan chuckled at. The two of them stood side by side at the door for a moment, both in the awkward position of waiting for the other to go first.

Then Ford smiled. “High six?” he asked, raising his palm with the zero on it.

“High six,” Stan agreed, and they stepped though the portal with their hands pressed together.

***

“You know, this is a little ironic,” Ford commented shortly after removing himself from the sand dune he’d faceplanted in. “Just before the exit showed up, I was thinking about how I was actually looking to exploring more of the train, since I’d have you by my side.”

“Oh, good. We both remember it,” Stan replied, spitting out sand. “I was always kind of wondering in the back of my mind if it was a hallucination. Also, that’s the sappiest thing I’ve heard all day, and I said some _really_ sappy stuff back there.”

Ford ignored the second half of his remark. “Well, even if our memories failed us, we’ve also got physical proof backing up the experience…”

He pulled out the device he’d stolen from the Cat, which was still glowing and reacting to both their voices and the ambient sounds of the beach. “I need to thank you for that time you tried to teach me to pickpocket, by the way. The train had a lot of advanced technology that I want to try and replicate, and it’s going to be a lot easier with an actual example to take apart.”

“Oh shit, you stole something? Ford, I have never been a prouder brother in my life.”

Ford chuckled. “It might be a tad unethical, but after some basic study I could probably claim to have ‘invented’ this, and use the funds from selling the patent to afford the tuition to a nicer college than Backupsmore. I do still want to spend some years studying and working on a higher education, but… I hope you’ll keep in touch when I do. It’ll be a lot less fun without you around.”

He rested a hand on the Stan O’ War. “And in the meantime, while I work on reverse engineering this technology… I think there’ll definitely be some time for some boat repair and treasure hunting.”

“Poindexter, your hand is in seagull shit. Better add ‘boat cleaning’ to that list.”

“Ugh, you’re right. At least it’s dry.” Ford carefully moved his hand to a less dirty spot on the boat. “So, that’s a yes to the treasure hunting?”

“Oh, you know it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Afterword:  
Using the sensor stolen from the Cat, Ford invents a new type of sonar that’s significantly more effective than the current versions. With that technology, the boys track down a bunch of shipwrecks, and start getting famous for their discoveries and “invention.”
> 
> When Filbrick hears about this and realizes that his sons are on a track to fame and fortune and not sharing any of it with him, he’s initially furious but then tries to approach them and ask them to let him back into their lives, which they refuse. (Caryn divorces him soon after, and Shermie cuts ties around the same time. None of them ever send him money.)
> 
> Thanks to his work, Ford wins a scholarship to a well-respected university — it’s not quite West Coast Tech, but it’s also a lot nicer than Backupsmore. He opts not to take classes in summer even though they’d help him graduate faster, and spends all his breaks sailing with Stan.
> 
> Stan does get a little bored during the school year when Ford is busy, but Ford notices and suggests he start drawing comics again. Stan is hesitant and a little insecure at first but eventually starts honing his art more and brainstorming plotlines with occasional input from Ford. Using some connections he made in treasure hunting press interviews, he eventually gets a deal to have a short comic series published — then it turns into a huge success, and his comics (loosely based of his and Ford’s childhood) get picked up for many more issues.
> 
> Somewhere along the line they become friends with Fidds, probably thanks to some inter-school technology fair where he and Ford both competed, and eventually the gang heads to Oregon to investigate the anomalies concentrated in a town called Gravity Falls. Bill shows up at some point and tries to pull some characteristically Bill bullshit, but he’s no match for a pair of twins that have actually developed some half-decent communication skills. Many more years down the line, Dipper and Mabel’s childhood is full of visits from their famous scientist/explorer/artist grunkles.
> 
> ***
> 
> Thank you for joining me on this crazy train ride! All your responses have meant a lot to me, and I know I’ll look back on this experience fondly (even if it was a lot shorter than my multichapter fics tend to be).


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